Catching Up

You can tell when I get a little busy as my blog gets a little neglected. Here is the cliff note version of the last three weeks.

Saturday, June 7 – Kim and I kicked off the inaugural Fall Fit training program as part of WoodlandsFit with the help of pace leaders Stephen Smith, Cathy Steele, Karen Felicidario, Misty Baugh, and Jessica Stanfield. We had 70 runners for the first training day, most focusing on San Antonio Rock-N-Roll. We have some Chicago, Nike Woman's, New York, and a few others in the mix.


Saturday, June 14 – I set up for the Fall Fit group early meeting Mike Lucas and Cathy Steele to go over the training plan and routes and then headed up to RTW5K to set up for the TWRC vs Seven Hills Challenge. We had the numbers to our advantage and won back the Saw Trophy. The added bonus of the day was seeing Dan Green run and having breakfast at Skeeters with friends from both clubs after the race.
Just before the start of TWRC/Seven Hills Challenge III

$30.00 worth of PVC, a few cones and a banner and we're almost first class

TWRC board members Dan Green, Pam Meaux and myself accept the Saw Trophy from Seven Hills President Niki Bellnoski

Jon Walk and I had a little announcement after the race.

Sunday, June 15 – Congratulations to Kim for winning her age group at the Kansas Ironman 70.3.

Tuesday, June 17 – Finally a good night at the track. No pain at all in my legs….now I can work on my endurance. I arrived early and warmed up well. The group arrived and we continued with our "easy" June workouts that are a little shorter to get used to the hotter weather. After a warm-up the group did 8 x 300 meters with a 100 recovery walk. I'm still a bit scared that I'll hurt something so I more or less played trying to run a little with as many different people as possible. Surprisingly I felt very good and could pace along with just about anyone. I have to say just about anyone as Jason Banes and Juan Cardenas were there. They are a couple of ex-University of Houston distance runners who warm-up at a 6 minute pace. They did an easy 5 mile run away from the track so we didn't have the experience of getting lapped every other lap. Jason is a new father so it'll be interesting to see if he can balance work (he's a HS Track Coach), the baby, and his training and get back to a 15 something 5K.


The question is "I'm not sure what I'm doing...what is the goal?














Here is why we do different types of workouts. Your running ability and performance is determined by a combination of factors:

1) The efficiency of your lungs, heart & blood in delivering oxygen throughout your body (VO2 Max)
2) The efficiency of the muscles translating oxygen and fuel into energy (Lactate Threshold)
3) The efficiency of the body in translating movement into speed across the ground (Running Economy)

Your running performance depends on how well your body can perform each of these tasks. A good training program will follow a hard/easy pattern and include components to make improvements in each of these areas. Each of the three components can also be broken down into either an efficiency or endurance type workout. This is why you will see different variations of workouts...the variety keeps them fun but also has a specific training goal.

VO2 Max
for efficiency - Interval training
for endurance - Long slow distance runs. (80% or less of current race pace for a given distance)

Lactate Threshold
for efficiency - Threshold runs, fartleks, cruise intervals
for endurance - Hill sessions, Long slow distance runs

Running Economy
for efficiency - Intervals (200m-800m)
for endurance - Goal pace runs, easy runs